It's very interesting to say the least. I made a quick gif out of the photos. So the heel and fingerboard extension is going in and out of the slot? How did you control the gap? I would think too wide a gap would be very noticeable and become unstable, while too narrow would cause a lot of friction. But thanks, that looks like a REALLY good solution right there. No fussing with saddle, bridge, nut anymore.

You may need to click the gif to make it work.

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A friend of mine, Jeb Hooker, has patented a mechanism for doing that on the fly. The neck basically rotates around the nut, so the string length is unchanged. He's set it up in various ways; the latest version has a small thumb wheel at the end of the fingerboard by the sound hole. It's quite easy to turn, works smoothly, and the tuning is unaffected.

omlove wrote:So the heel and fingerboard extension is going in and out of the slot?

Yes. Rotation is about a centre under the 12th/13th fret; my interpretation of the Stauffer "Legnani" joint from the early 19th century. (Nothing is new!)

omlove wrote:How did you control the gap?

Carefully! The pockets in the body are routed. The neck/heel are hand shaped to fit. The gap tolerances are down to the finish film thickness. One coat too many and the joint can lock up. They're that tightly toleranced to allow free movement without slop. The pivot design is very simple but very cunning. Whilst externally there is tilt (pitch) adjustment, internally, there is roll, yaw, height and length adjustment. The pivot design offers a lot of stability which (for example) was required for this tilt-neck cutaway guitar.

DSCF9068cs.jpg

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The thin sliver of wood down the treble side of the neck is fragile and you don't want it to take any load if the neck takes a blow. So it's (cunningly) designed so that it doesn't. The tilt angle can be adjusted in less than 5 seconds, without tools. The cone thingy in the second pic is just a strap button. Nothing to do with the tilt adjustment.

And getting back to the OP's original point (detachable necks) I can get the neck off in less than a minute, most of which time is spent dropping the tension off the strings.

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End of last year I bought an old Hopf guitar in very good condition with solid spruce top and laminated back and sides for €100. (Thanks to Michael for the good hint with the old German guitars with detachable neck!) The guitar was build in April 1975 and already has a detachable neck. With a weight of about 1500g it's not too heavy to take it with me on my next holiday trip. The only problem left was that it needs too much space when it is put in a case, so there was not much space left for clothes and other things:

hopf_travel_guitar_0.jpg

The solution for this problem was to cut a 20cm x 20cm large hole in the back of the guitar. To be able to close the hole, there should be 4 wood ledges glued to the border of the hole. I created the following 1-1 sketch of my idea:

hopf_travel_guitar_1.jpg

Beginning of this week I could convince my local carpenter to execute this work, and this morning I received my guitar back. Here is the result:

hopf_travel_guitar_2.jpg

Now I can store my clothes easily inside the guitar. What is missing is the mechanism to screw the 20cm x 20cm patch on the hole. I have already ordered some tiny screws (6mm length) and I have to drill some holes in the patch and the ledges. I also want to replace the tuners. The last thing that is missing is the booking of my next holiday trip

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Happiness is when what you think what you say and what you do are in harmony.

One problem with making a travel guitar is that the standard size for many airline carry-on's is 22" x14" x 9". The length is about right for a normal Classical body, but most guitars are more than 14" wide, so there's no allowance for a box to put it in. When I made a folding harp guitar for Ken Bonfield a couple of years ago I used a body width of 13", which allowed for a case and a little bit of padding. It was a squeeze getting everything in, but it works. You can see him playing the instrument on his web site.

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I also do an adjustable neck angle joint which allows the action to be adjusted without using any tools. Both of these neck joints can be disassembled in less time than it takes to wind the tension off the strings (if winding by hand).

There are some pics of guitars with these neck joints here, with some comments on what people thought about the guitars.

andreas777 wrote:EDIT says that steel string travel guitars are also a no-go.

I use the same neck joints on steel string guitars and they work fine. I originally developed the bolted joint shown above for steel string guitars.

Great job! What is a price range of guitars like that?
If one would make guitar with such joint plus a little bit smaller body and shorter neck and smaller headstock - then the whole thing will fit into carry-on suitcase. Then it will be really good and useful travel instrument and possibly nice solution for many performers...

Great job! What is a price range of guitars like that?
If one would make guitar with such joint plus a little bit smaller body and shorter neck and smaller headstock - then the whole thing will fit into carry-on suitcase. Then it will be really good and useful travel instrument and possibly nice solution for many performers...

Great job! What is a price range of guitars like that?
If one would make guitar with such joint plus a little bit smaller body and shorter neck and smaller headstock - then the whole thing will fit into carry-on suitcase. Then it will be really good and useful travel instrument and possibly nice solution for many performers...

Though I'm sure the airlines would still find a way to destroy it.

Yes they are the problem... But it will be more difficult for them if one carry his carry-on all the time...and suitcase will well built case.

Great job! What is a price range of guitars like that?
If one would make guitar with such joint plus a little bit smaller body and shorter neck and smaller headstock - then the whole thing will fit into carry-on suitcase. Then it will be really good and useful travel instrument and possibly nice solution for many performers...

Though I'm sure the airlines would still find a way to destroy it.

Yes they are the problem... But it will be more difficult for them if one carry his carry-on all the time...and suitcase will well built case.

What is a price range of guitars like that?
If one would make guitar with such joint plus a little bit smaller body and shorter neck and smaller headstock - then the whole thing will fit into carry-on suitcase. Then it will be really good and useful travel instrument and possibly nice solution for many performers...

For prices, if you hit the "Contact" button on the right you'll be able to find my website and be able to contact me directly if you wish.

The tilt-neck guitars in the pictures are 340mm lower bout, the bolt-on neck 365mm lower bout width, both being 650mm scale concert guitars. The issue for a travel guitar, though, is the fretboard/headstock length, which is ~650mm when detached from the body. To shorten that by 100mm for airline requirements with a 650m scale length means losing a few high frets, a "stubby" head stock design, and shortening of the mortise in the body and the corresponding neck tenon. It is this latter issue that would need a re-design of both my bolt on neck and the tilt neck to get below the 22" (560mm) airline requirement. For a "normal" scale length, the 560mm limit pretty well dictates a split fretboard design. But then it becomes a travel guitar rather than concert guitar.

On my 'test mules' I use a stub fingerboard on the top, so the neck itself is only half the scale length plus the head. This raises the possibility of the stub ending up at an angle to the rest of the fretboard as the guitar changes shape over time under string pressure. Although I have not given it much thought it ought to be possible to build in some sort of adjustment for this.

Alternatively, you can do as I have done with my test mules when traveling; since I didn't have a case for them I just carried the box on, and put the neck in my checked bag. This obviates any concerns the security folks might have about you using the strings to garrote a fellow passenger.

Using the type of tuners they install on Portuguese guitars or English guittars could also save some length. For that matter, so might friction pegs or geared Pegheds.